Angel of Chaos, A Story of the 61st Millennium
by esLaSH
Summary: It is the 61st millennium, and much has changed. On a world defecting from the Chaos Imperium, the psyker Gigaron discovers dangerous secrets within an abandoned Astronomican...
1. Twenty Thousand Years Later

_Disclaimer: All Warhammer 40,000 concepts are property of Games Workshop. No challenge is intended._

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><p><strong>1: Twenty Thousand Years Later<strong>

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><p>Gigaron had never seen an Astronomican so badly damaged.<p>

"I fear it will take years to fully repair the beacon, Lord Mercantile," he said. "Even from here, I can tell it is in a defensive mood. The Empire must have misused it terribly."

Lord Mercantile Lucas Grelm, leader of House Grelm and de facto administrator of seven star systems, nodded. "According to my family histories, no higher functions have been recorded from the beacon over the past seven hundred years. We did not need them; the Empire provided House Grelm with navigators, and we were able to manage internal trade through the lower functions."

Gigaron looked at Lucas. "Lower functions?"

The Lord Mercantile was used to deference, from his populace, or contempt, from the Imperial Court. The straightforward nature of the Commonwealth magus was... different. Although he did not seem ferocious, an auburn-haired man with slim shoulders, a red gem at his throat, and a slight smile, Lucas sensed a core of steel behind the magus's regard. He had seen such steel before, but only in the immortal Astartes of the Empire. It was a good sign, that the Commonwealth should send such people to accept his fealty.

"Yes, Strike Magus. It was before the foundation of my House, some four thousand years ago. During a period of Commonwealth rule, the Astronomican was used to construct a nexus of warp corridors that now connect the seven systems of Realm Glorious. Even without Commonwealth psykers staffing the beacon, the warp nexus linked the region together with foot traffic."

"An impressive achievement." Gigaron looked back at the Astronomican. From their vantage atop the Grelm Citadel, six hundred kilometers south of the beacon, he could see most of one side of the vast structure. A storm was brewing along one flank, blue-black hammerheads of cloud crawling low along the white parapets. The upper reaches of the tower were the blue-white of a distant moon, standing altogether above the atmosphere.

But parts of that towering monolith had seen better days. Low-flung buttresses the size of cities dripped with jungle. Gaping holes were open in its upper flanks. And yet...

"And yet, I note the structure appears quite abandoned."

"You perceive correctly," said Lucas. "The corridors were the foundation of House Grelm's power, and with the resultant wealth we bought the loyalty of the Imperial Navigators. When we had the patronage of the Navigators, we did not need the corridors to hold onto power."

"But it was not your choice to abandon them, was it, Lord Mercantile?"

Lucas sighed. "And this brings us to the crux of the matter. No, the tunnels were lost to us when the Astronomican was damaged. It was a tumultuous period. The Empire had mounted a Black Crusade, seeking to break your blockade on the Eye of Terror and free the Old Gods."

"Starchild fend," muttered Gigaron.

"Apparently," agreed Lucas. "They failed, of course. I doubt the holy sector will ever return to the Chaos Imperium, not with your Star Gods on the defence. But as part of the campaign, they annexed the Realm Glorious systems. Our Astronomican would have permitted your own navigators to operate along the flank of the Crusade."

"Your predecessor surrendered rather than fight."

"We had little choice, Strike Magus. The Emperor himself directed the Loyalist Astartes to wipe us out if we resisted. Tartaros XVIII, I believe. He and his son died in battle within eyeshot of the old Imperial Capitol on Cadia, his troops thrown back and his dynasty ended, but the occupation forces remained in our cities."

"I understand. Your ancestors chose to protect your people, rather than die pointlessly. I would have made the same choice."

"Indeed. Anyway, the Grelm heir was much taken with the Imperial traditions, and offered our House's support to the Sectus Apotheosis Chaoticum."

"And the SAC thought they could use this Astronomican in their quest to awaken a new Chaos God. How far did they get before the tower overloaded?"

"Nobody knows. The original Grelm Citadel was much closer to the beacon when it went up, and a tertiary boost antenna fell on it. We lost many records. However, that is when the problems began. Nothing was alive in that tower, and when we sent scouts into the corridors, nothing returned."

"So the Imperial Navigators were your only connection to the seven systems."

"And this past year, when the Sennac Dynasty seized the Imperial throne, they withdrew their patronage of our shipping. The Navigators will no longer guide us through the Warp. House Grelm needs that Astronomican, Strike Magus. We cannot hold our house or realm together without it."

"The Commonwealth is glad to help, Lord Mercantile."

"I am glad to hear it. Something lives in those corridors even now; my best scouts went in there three months ago, and we haven't heard a thing. Whatever is wrong with the Astronomican, I am helpless to fix it."

Gigaron nodded. "Then let us begin. Rage Heart! Query the local data banks. I want a map of those corridors."

"Yes sir," said the gem at his throat. "One moment. Shall I display?"

"Please."

Magenta energy traced a complex knot of paths and infrastructure on the air before Gigaron. He looked left, right, left again, and gestured the map away. "I have reinforcements on a cruise titan in the Enjyat System, at the far end of the corridor network. We shall enter at opposite ends, and meet in the middle. That should give us a good idea of what awaits us."

"You are confident in victory, then? How many legions can you bring to bear against the chaos taint in those warp tunnels?"

Gigaron put a finger to his temple. "Interstellar transmission, set up. Sector tight beam. Brother Vitus! Is the Enjyat complex secure?"

_Of course, Gar. The locals were very helpful and now I'm bored. What do you have for me?_

"Have the Count analyse the map I am sending. We're going into the webway. Can you be ready in twenty minutes?"

_Like I'm not ready now. Race you to the centerpoint?_

"Don't do anything foolish, Brother. Deploy in 20, and go slow. There might be anything in there. Gigaron, over."

_Very well, I'll keep my eyes open. Vitus, out._

"We're ready to go, Lord Mercantile." Gigaron lowered his hand. "Alert your forces that I will be going in."

Lucas nodded, and tapped commands into his wrist terminal. "How many units shall I tell them to expect?"

"Including Brother Vitus? Two. Rage Heart: Set Up!"

Lucas blinked.

Gigaron lifted off the ground. A spasm of psyker energy arced into the gem at his throat. Magenta flame washed across his clothing; shards of metal sang and circled and collapsed in around him. In the time it took to blink again, the Strike Magus was fully caparisoned. His battle robe was white and sleek, piped with blue at the cuffs and hem, pips of red on the protective jacket. The gem of his Intelligence shone red in its staff mount. Runes and diagnostics flickered in the air below his feet.

"Lord Mercantile, it has been a pleasure. I shall return."

The Strike Magus shot skyward and vanished in a streak of vapour. Lucas Grelm stared after him.

Two warriors to defeat an evil that had haunted his people for nearly a millennium?

Either this truly was the end of his house, or joining the Commonwealth was a truly inspired choice.


	2. Threshold

_Disclaimer: All Warhammer 40,000 concepts are property of Games Workshop. No challenge is intended._

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><p><strong>2: Threshold<strong>

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><p>Air bled through the hypersonic cavitation shield. It clawed at Gigaron's hair and robe and eyes like a storm wind. He felt alive.<p>

"Commonwealth Strike Magus to South Equatorial Air Control. Permission to approach defensive line."

_Permission granted, Strike Magus. Colonel Narvariel commanding the Fourteenth Grelm Halbardiers on the ground. We weren't expecting you so soon, but all should be in readiness._

"Acknowledged." Gigaron cut the signal and arced down towards the intersection between land and sky. This close, the Grelm Astronomican filled half the world. A highway pushed into the jungle at its base; obviously well-made, to have lasted so long without repair. Descending, he saw the defensive line arrayed across the road, and altered course to land before the command pavilion.

A pair of flight-capable guards and attendant drones escorted him in. This Narvariel ran a tight camp. Gigaron approved. Touching down, he ran an eye over the duty guards, assessing their equipment and bearing. These were heavy troops; they wore breastplates and vambraces over their black-and-violet battle robes. They carried solid psi halberds slung across their backs; the venerable weapons had the look of long service about them. They were no Intelligences, but he had a feeling the guards knew how to use them.

Elsewhere in the camp rose the murmur of troops reciting focus mantras. Also a good sign. The more fanatical Imperial loyalists despised such mental control and the stability it brought the Warp, but most Imperial citizens made the most of Starchild's gifts. Even the uneasy ones – a row of Gift Soldiers stood utterly motionless and apart from the main camp, necrodermis glittering darkly in the equatorial sun.

"Strike Magus Gigaron?" The speaker was an eldar, wearing the bars of a House Grelm Colonel. Her cool gaze betrayed the merest glimpse of concern. And that was itself concerning.

"At ease, Colonel. I'm just checking over your picket before heading into the structure. These are good soldiers."

"Thank you, sir."

"How would you rate the soldiers that went in three months ago?"

Narvariel frowned. "The scout regiment was led by my cousin. Four Moon Spectres were veterans, Strike Magus. Losing them was unprecedented."

"No survivors? Not even a signal or premonition?"

"No, sir. They left redundant line-of-sight transponders all along their route. Four hours after they entered the structure, the transmitter network registered sudden signal loss across the gateway. Since then, nothing. We sent a drone to examine the gate, and we can identify what looks like their transponders just inside, but they aren't broadcasting. Nothing from the other worlds in the Realm Glorious, either. They're just... gone."

"Well, at least it looks like the problems are limited to the internal spaces. Just in case, however, put your people on high alert. Whatever's in there, I aim to get its attention. It could get unpleasant."

"Acknowledged. Will there be anything else?"

"Have your astropaths record my signal for as long as possible. Oh, and forgive the intrusion, but how is your grandmother taking the loss of your cousin?"

The woman blinked. "She mourns his passing, but our family know that service means sacrifice. Why do you ask?"

"Family is important," said Gigaron. "Pass on my regards when next you see her." It hurt him to be dishonest, but if eldar had gone into the corridors, he had to check. The eldar had always kept secrets. If Narvariel and her cousin had been born like most eldar, that was one less thing to worry about. "I will enter the structure in 5 minutes. Be alert."

"Yes sir." She saluted as the Strike Magus lifted off his feet again, and accelerated smoothly down the old highway.

The Grelm Astronomican yawned ahead.


	3. Above

_Disclaimer: All Warhammer 40,000 concepts are property of Games Workshop. No challenge is intended._

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><p><strong>3: Above<strong>

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><p>The Commonwealth Cruise Titan <em>Flame of Redemption<em> dropped lower in the vacuum above Realm Prime, limbs spreadeagled, her six psi wings deployed and fluorescing. The gaze of the great machine was fixed on the great tower below. She was expending a great amount of energy to remain on station so far below geosynchronous orbit.

"Be calm, my fire," whispered Captain Khron. She stood on the bridge of her vessel within the upper torso. The cruise titan was a light long-range vessel, designed to deploy well beyond the safe space of the Astronomica Net. As such, eldar navigators able to read the infinite paths of the Warp were in high demand for such ships. Khron had inherited the command from her 'father', Captain Linidei. The familial relationship was entirely ceremonial; Linidei had no blood ties to Khron.

In fact, neither had blood at all. Although she appeared to be a young woman, short raven hair matching her uniform robes and silver-piped jacket, Khron had more in common with the Intelligence of her ship than with its crew. Most eldar of the great Navigator Houses were a great deal older and stranger than they were comfortable letting on.

_There is a confrontation coming_, said the _Flame_. _I fear for our friends_.

"Gar knows what he is doing. And Brother Vitus comes to his side. Believe me, I see more strands to the pattern than you, and so many burn away. But Gigaron has a way of finding the narrow path through the flames. Trust in his judgement."

_I do. But I am remaining on alert. I will be no obstacle if you authorise the use of positron weapons._

Inside her head, Khron winced. The _Flame_ was a warship. It was inordinately proud of its main guns: several hundred tonnes of electromagnetic compressors maintaining the metastable form of several hundred kilogrammes of picosculpted proton bubbles, home to two hundred grammes of positrons in suspension. The ship could maintain a constant stream of positrons on each of several targets, or deploy them through a planet's atmosphere in supercavitating plasma sheaths.

When a positron met an electron, the two particles cancelled out. Their mass converted to raw energy. A vast amount of energy. Most fire solutions were measured in milligrammes. The warship could flatten a city with a single gramme. Its positron magazine contained enough munitions to reduce every city on an entire planet to slag.

Mass conversion weapons were horrifically powerful.

Khron had no wish to use them on an inhabited planet. Of course, she also had no wish to dissuade the warship. Its eagerness was naïve but adorable.

"Thank you. How is the sensor feed from the Strike Magus?"

_There is some distortion from the dormant beacon. It twists like fingers in the Warp. Signal is unlikely to deteriorate beyond strength 4._

"Continue to monitor and record." Khron dipped her mind into the ship's sensor feed. She saw, felt, half-remembered the vast mouth of the Grelm Astronomicon pass around her. The whole ship could have walked through that passage. The arch looked weirdly organic from so far away, its buttresses and supports like the branches of some titanic marble tree. Plants dripped from nooks and crannies in the design where the loam of millennia had fallen.

The floor was choked with debris. The scouts of Four Moon Spectres had marked their way; transponder pods blinked amidst the shattered road surface and morass of vegetation. They were clearly operational. Why, Khron wondered, were they not transmitting?

The sensor feed crackled. Her mind flickered with numbness.

_-et that, Flame? I'm sens-_

The view seemed to warp. Colour bled from the world. Somewhere inside the beacon, Gigaron flew through an unnatural city where no lights shone and nothing grew. But she couldn't tell which way was up. Her mind warred with various sensory organs across her body; the sensation would have reminded a human of nausea, although of course her sensorium was of far more efficient design. Was this dark city one of the ground, or jutting crazily from the roof? She couldn't tell.

_-ot receiving telemetry; signal may be-_

Khron pulled back to the bridge. "We're being jammed. Identify the source."

The _Flame of Redemption_ growled. _Source is definitely inside the beacon. I do not – Captain, I know this signature. Whatever is blocking our link, it is a powerful mind – and it has been trained in the arts of the Star Gods._

"Are you certain? This makes no sense. Why would a Commonwealth mind be jamming Gigaron?"

_Any conjecture would be aimless_, rumbled the ship. _All I can do is force a tight link before the jamming grows too intense; we will have voice communications, but little else._

"That is all I could ask," said Khron. She noticed her hand was clenched into a fist. That would not do. Her soul sailed upon currents of time and space; the past and future were a tome for her eyes only. Serenity and control, those were the watchwords of the wraith.

If only the pages of the future were not so... dark.


	4. In The Dark

_Disclaimer: All Warhammer 40,000 concepts are property of Games Workshop. No challenge is intended._

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><p><strong>4: In The Dark<strong>

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><p>The sun was gone.<p>

"Rage Heart: soft flare. What happened to the way we came in?"

Rose-coloured light glittered from a dead city. Gigaron stood on air between two towers that spanned all the way to the ceiling. This had the look of an administration facility, one dedicated to coordinating the trade of seven star systems. The marble faces of long-forgotten high tronagers and merchant patrons glowered with empty eyes from eaves and the statuary of high plazas.

"I am not sure. Immense space-time curvature detected. The way out is no longer there."

"Not good. Rage Heart, I'm invoking field authorisation for full offensive capability. Deactivate physical safeties on tactical protocols, go to vocal confirmation. Acknowledge."

"Yes, sir. Safeties to vocal confirmation."

_Gigaron? Gigaron, are you receiving me?_

"Loud and clear, Captain. My exit just disappeared. Can you keep the link going?"

_Affirmative. It looks like the jamming wasn't designed to cut combat links, but don't drop out – I doubt we could find you again if the link breaks. We'll have to rely on voice comms until you can find a way out._

"Believe me, I'm looking." Gigaron cruised higher, concentrating his focus. "Rage Heart, search protocol. Confirm our position with your cartographic data."

Magenta lights raced out across the city. "Search under way. Estimate two minutes to confirmation."

"It will have to do. Captain, I'll follow the scout company's trail until I have a better idea of what's going on here."

_Good luck. And, Gar, be on your guard – the jammer knows the ways of the Star Gods._ Khron went silent, but tension radiated down the link.

Gigaron didn't say anything. They both knew that he might not be coming back. But a Strike Magus went in. Always. How could he ask others to do what he would not? If death came to this dark world, it would not find him fleeing his duty.

Below, the transponders described a path along the central highway, then curved away onto an access ramp. The city rose like the foothills of mountains, row upon row of warehouses and dormitories and the shattered shells of useless masonry. According to the maps, this was an old rest stop; the scout company had probably set up base here.

But they had never left.

A plaza yawned in the urban landscape. The transponders led to one of the buildings on its edge, a towering structure clad in glass. Many of its windows were empty and dark.

Barricades had been erected across the plaza. Someone had expected a battle.

A figure was standing in the open.

Gigaron's heart skipped in a moment of hope and dread. Then there was another, and another, and he knew what he was seeing. Silent figures stood everywhere, a fine layer of dust on their gleaming shoulders.

"Necron drones. Gift Soldiers, in Grelm colours. Captain, the scouts brought necrons into the Astronomican!"

_Are you certain? No, they could easily have forgotten – it's been so long since House Grelm used the corridors. Do you suppose a necron presence could have destabilised the warp nexus, trapped you in there?_

"No, I don't think so. The corridors are still intact – there's been some distortion, but it's limited to earthquake damage. And there's no sign of the living scouts. Whatever happened here, it must be related to the original haunting of the beacon."

Rage Heart flashed in its staff mount. "Area search complete. Confirming massive spatial reorganisation. Master, the corridors now form an infinite loop. We are alone in this universe."

Gigaron sighed. "So we'll have to find the source of the distortion if we want to get out."

"We may have to eliminate it. Check my ammunition."

The Strike Magus chuckled, and circled lower. He kept an eye on the motionless necrons. While they were little threat to a psyker of his calibre, a surprise attack could still overwhelm him, and the scout company could easily have left orders to eliminate all intruders.

Lower. The machines did not stir.

Gigaron concentrated. His shields were stable. A Star God-trained psyker mastered protocols to disrupt the necron flayer weapons, but it came down to raw strength.

He hovered before a Gift Soldier, touched down slowly. This close, the machine seemed to loom in the dark. Dust speckled its shoulders and the rib-like vents of its torso. A green glow throbbed in the weapon held across its chest. Its eyes were inky pits.

It didn't move.

"Gift Soldier," he said quietly. "Gift Soldier, acknowledge my presence."

There was a susurrus somewhere inside the skeletal shell. The necron remained perfectly still.

"You are witnessed," ground a voice like stone.

Gigaron heaved a silent breath of relief. "Gift Soldier, you have been here many months without movement. Why? What are your orders?"

The voice ground out. "We were ordered to halt and prepare camp. The order was executed. We have halted."

"But your commanders – they are no longer here. What happened to them?"

The necron stared into the darkness over Gigaron's head. Not a speck of dust moved on its necrodermis. "Gift Warriors may defend themselves when attacked," it intoned. "We were not attacked, thus we have not moved since halting. We were not so susceptible as the living."

Hair stood up on the back of Gigaron's neck. "Susceptible?"

"Motion detected," said Rage Heart quietly.

"Command has been terminated," said the necron. The Strike Magus took a step sideway, looking around. "While the flesh chassis remains, its allegiance has altered. Our program does not permit us to obey."

Something moved on the other side of the plaza.

"Rage Heart, shooting mode," ordered Gigaron. The staff warped; broad tines extended from its head. He stepped behind the necron, ducked down.

"Your objective is here." The sepulchral voice sounded eerily satisfied. Green fire woke in the empty eye sockets. All across the plaza, the motionless Gift Soldiers were lighting up, anticipating what was to come.

Figures filed onto the plaza, fanning out to cover the scattered barricades. Gigaron could see robes in the cut of House Grelm. But there was something wrong about those figures...

A distant hand raised.

Psi halberds came up.

Bolts of livid energy smashed out. Two caught a heavy concrete barricade, split it in three, sent the pieces cartwheeling across the plaza in corkscrews of gravel and dust. One splashed against Gigaron's shield and exploded in a plume of harmless fire, washing black soot across the ground.

Two caught the Gift Soldier in the abdomen.

The necron's back bulged and burst. It staggered back a step, forcing Gigaron to retreat. He could see the far side of the plaza through the machine's sundered chest. The flayer in its hands barked once, kicking a hole the size of his head into the ground nearby.

There was a chorus of fire from across the plaza. Two of the attackers twisted. Green flame vomited from a head, an arm, torsos suddenly shattered. One fell, hideously, in two directions.

The other shrieked, once, and brought its weapon around again. Gigaron's magnified vision sought out its face. His eyes widened. In the split second before it evaporated under a hail of flayer fire, he had seen through its mouth and out the other side.

Sudden silence settled. The necrons were still, weapons trained on the smouldering remains of the two who had struck their companion. Above Gigaron, the necrodermis of the shattered torso was already sucking back into position with an awful series of creaking groans. Rivulets of fine dust drifted to the ground from its body. The attackers had gone for cover, but the Gift Soldiers ignored them.

"Gigaron to Flame of Redemption," he gasped into the fragile quiet. "I've found the scout party."

_Survivors! Most excellent. Are they in fit condition to assist you?_

"No. No, damn it. They're possessed, Khron. Daemons took them."


	5. The Damned

_Disclaimer: All Warhammer 40,000 concepts are property of Games Workshop. No challenge is intended._

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><p><strong>5: The Damned<strong>

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><p>"Rage Heart, can you interface with the Gift Soldiers?" Gigaron glanced around the mending necron. How many possessed were out there?<p>

"Negative. The slave circuits are encrypted and House Grelm has not provided us with the key."

"Damn. All right, I'll feed you twenty percent power. Get to breaking their command codes – I don't want anybody else killed in here."

The daemons hadn't fired again. They obviously hadn't anticipated the cold bloodthirst of the Gift Soldiers. They were obviously coordinating a silent redeployment.

Gigaron shot into the air, swept the area with a split-second gaze, and jinked sideways behind a cluster of necrons twenty meters away. The pavement blurred centimeters from his eyes; he was flying below knee height, weaving between concrete barricades and metal legs. Two shots boiled air where he'd hovered. One blew out windows across three stories of a tower in the distance; molten glass pinged and clattered across rooftops. The other came from above, striking the plaza and lifting a barricade three stories into the air on a plume of blue fire.

Fliers. So much for any hope of a quick escape.

The barricade smashed back into the ground. Pavement cracked and necrons staggered, but their weapons remained eerily focused on the steaming remains of the two possessed.

Where were the others?

He'd just seen them. Focus. Daemon sorcery was no match for a mind trained in Star God mantras. _I see myself, and define myself, and am myself. I see the truth to all illusions, my own and those beyond_.

There. Three groups, plus the air patrol. Pincer movement. They were moving in on both sides, hoping to push him against their main force.

That was a mistake.

"I am tuned to the necron phase network," said Rage Heart. "Their signals are still secure, but I can isolate their locations."

"Good. Heads-up display on." Green targets sprang up across the plaza. Gigaron shot around a parked hover transport, necrons in parallax on his retina.

A clean shot. He ascended two storeys into the air and braced.

Energy smashed against his shield, against the ground below. Plumes of dust and sparks shot up. A rainbow line flickered from somewhere above – portable singularity weapon? No matter, his anti-necron shields shrugged off the ripping pressure of its fire.

Symbols radiated below his boots. This would require a second to focus.

"Divine."

He could see the daemons in front of him. There were a dozen, about half the force he could see. Hollow faces raised towards him in slow motion. They seemed so paper-thin, like they were barely there.

"Blaster."

No mercy.

"Release!"

The recoil pushed him back against his rune circle. Rage Heart bucked in his two-handed grip. A lance of magenta flame wider than his armspan flashed out, swept across the daemon centre like it wasn't there, and tore the plaza to shreds behind them.

He shot away again, losing himself in the cloud of dust that erupted around him.

The plaza behind the daemons was faced by a broad tower, at least thirty storeys tall. Most of the ground floor was now simply missing. The tower seemed to retain its shape for a moment of freefall, then it struck the ground and folded up in a shower of glass and steel fragments.

The noise was immense.

Gigaron was already on the move. Dust smashed past him in weird vortices. He halted directly over the daemons, Rage Heart at the ready. He didn't think they'd still be moving after that much stun power, but nobody took chances with their kind.

The bodies lay scattered on the plaza. They were no like daemon he'd ever seen. The hosts were still intact, but they'd been utterly washed of colour. Their skin looked like fine porcelain, white and translucent, uniformly hairless. Through slack mouths and unblinking eyes, he could see right through them to the rubble underneath. Some of them were cracked. Horribly, it seemed as though any part he couldn't see directly just... didn't exist.

They held psi halberds, mostly unchanged. One had imploded around itself, metal tines wrapped around the wielder's hand. Another was obviously warped, its crisp metal lines transformed to hollow porcelain chambers. It had a single empty eye. The daemons were possessing weapons too.

A piece of the tower toppled, holding integrity for an awful moment, then toppled towards them. Gigaron raised one hand and projected a shield bubble around the possessed. Steel and glass wrapped around it, flowing like fluid under the pressure of their fall, before exploding away across the plaza in tiny pieces.

Away. A necron loomed ahead, HUD icon and black silhouette and green fire grinning into the dust storm. Its weapon was pointed directly at Gigaron, and for a moment he thought he'd miscalculated, that he'd hit a Gift Soldier with debris – but its aim did not waver. It was still aiming at the dead.

A nearby tower, still intact, formed a vantage point. Gigaron hovered to one side, pressed against the penthouse windows. The last of the falling tower settled in a dreadful cacophony. Dust washed down the streets of the dark city.

It was silent for a time.

"Commoner mage!"

The voice was weak, like a shriek that could rise no louder than a whisper. One of the fliers was nearby.

"Why do you mock us, commoner? Why do you shelter the lost?"

Gigaron checked his shields. He'd taken some hits. Field strength was down; he wouldn't want to rely on it without a full rebuild, and that would leave him vulnerable and visible for precious seconds. He'd have to catch incoming fire manually.

"You shall not escape," screamed the voice softly. "All escape is lost. All is the domain of the master. Abandon your mortal certainties, commoner! The master comes! The master finds!"

The Strike Magus clenched his teeth. He wanted their surrender, of course. Daemon possession was a reversible condition, but the daemons always objected. Violently. If he called for surrender, they'd probably just start killing hosts.

That was unacceptable.

He executed two quick protocols and left them in the building's shadow, rocketing out into the upper air. Rolled sideways, pumped a half dozen shots straight down. Daemons staggered and fell. A stray shot exploded across the pavement; soot and sparks cascaded, crashing into the air as they hit barricades.

A flash of motion.

The psi halberd clashed against Rage Heart's haft. Sparks spat. The Intelligence rang like a bell, but its light never faltered. Inches from Gigaron's face, a pale daemon snapped teeth in an empty mouth.

He cupped one hand under the locked weapons. Runes flared and the daemon reeled away, struggling to remain airborne a moment before crashing to a halt on a balcony. Two more blasts to keep it down.

One group of daemons remained on the ground. They were being cautious, using necrons for cover. Fire lashed up at Gigaron, but he raised one hand and the shots splashed harmlessly on air.

Not moving.

Perfect target.

Two voices shrieked in the sky behind him. All his energy was directed the other way.

Gigaron braced and directed a series of pinpoint beams down at the plaza. The necrons didn't even flinch as energy burned the air around them. Five daemons bounced nerveless to the pavement.

Twin flashes of light came behind him. Reserve homing shots. Had they really thought he'd leave himself open? Daemons tumbled past his shoulders, trailing sparks towards the plaza.

"Collision alert," said Rage Heart.

Gigaron looked up in alarm, but the sky was clear. The daemons were all down.

No. He wasn't in danger.

He dived at full speed, pulled back just as hard. The hypersonic shield rang twice as he left and returned to subsonic speeds. An unconscious daemon hung in his arms. Two meters below, a necron's eyes bored green into his own.

Its weapon had never moved.

Carefully, he set the daemon to the ground.

"Gigaron to Flame of Retribution," he said, eyes still on the Gift Soldier. "Twenty-four survivors neutralised. Two more lost to friendly fire."

_You are so strange_, said Khron in his head. The eldar sounded bemused. _There is no shame in slaying your foes. Send the daemons back to the warp._

"Khron, if I followed your old battlefield pragmatism, I'd have no friends whatsoever. Did you really think I'd kill without dire necessity?"

The eldar was silent.

"Khron?"

"Signal lost," said Rage Heart.

"All is lost!"

The shriek echoed in the back of his head, even as he brought the Intelligence around to cover the sky. He'd missed one. Had it been hanging back?

The white-faced daemon stood atop a tower, half in shadow. Unlike the sleek, utilitarian buildings that made up most of the city, this one was crowned with an eerie archaic congeries of gargoyles and twisted stone. Despite Gigaron's soft flare, the shadows of the decoration behind the possessed were inky dark.

Too dark.

Something was standing behind the daemon, something utterly invisible, like a hole in his vision. Billows of its nature washed across the gargoyles like wings or a cape in the wind.

"This one, master! This commoner! All my brethren are lost!"

"Silence, lesser one." The voice fell like velvet on the back of the neck. "In sorrow, they live on. Slave of certainty! Yield now, and be welcome to the ranks of the abandoned!"

"That's not going to happen. I am Strike Magus Gigaron of the Commonwealth! Identify yourself and surrender, or I will be forced to subdue you!"

The figure drew itself up. It seemed twice as tall as the daemon before it. Fingers of shadow clawed at that porcelain face.

"I? I have no name. It left me long ago. I gave it willingly to fuel the birth rite of my God."

"Caution, master," said Rage Heart.

Birth rite? That was not good. In the ten-millennium history of the Commonwealth, that rite had been executed successfully a total of twenty-one times. It was performed by the highest-ranking psykers of the holy schools, the legendary Angels whose will bade them live forever to shepherd the destiny of all living things.

Each rite was now celebrated as the apotheosis of a new Star God of the Starchild's legacy.

"But your birth rite failed!" he shouted back. "The Astronomican overloaded, and nothing has emerged from its bowels in the centuries since! Where is your god, child of Chaos?"

It took a moment to recognise the rhythm pressing against his ears. It was, perhaps, laughter. Or sobs.

"My god is lost. My god is loss! Not here, not anywhere you can find it. Alone I am trapped in its birthplace – I am the last Angel of Ahouul, Chaos God of Loss!"


	6. Alone

_Disclaimer: All Warhammer 40,000 concepts are property of Games Workshop. No challenge is intended._

* * *

><p><strong>6: Alone<strong>

* * *

><p>"Divine blaster: release!"<p>

The top of the tower blew apart. Gargoyles span outward on a cloud of dust and magenta fire. Masonry punched through rooftops, windows exploded into the streets in showers of glass.

The Angel erupted out of the dust cloud on wings of night. The lesser daemon had taken the brunt of the blast, but even so, its master had simply shrugged off an attack that could level buildings.

"Unknown war!"

Something ripped the air into helices around the Angel. The plaza exploded around Gigaron. Shockwave after shockwave hammered his shield from every side. Gravel and masonry and whole concrete berms were tossed into the air. Necrons went tumbling.

The Strike Magus caught a pair of well-aimed blasts on his hand, and was hammered against the pavement. His boots pushed into the ceramic ankle-deep in a fountain of shards. Only his shields kept him in one piece.

There was an immediate reaction. The plaza lit up green as a ragged barrage of necron flayers clawed at the Angel in the sky. Others clambered back to their feet and intensified fire. The shadow warped and flickered, taken aback by the concentrated disintegrator fire.

"Hopeless," it muttered, and pointed.

A necron took two steps backward and fell in half. Another span around twice, but its pelvis stayed static; its torso exploded in a shower of twisted metal.

Gigaron looked around, momentarily free of the barrage. Yes, that would do. A quick series of blasts shattered the much-abused plaza once more; telekinesis dragged two huge shards together over his head, forming a crude shelter.

A metal skull rebounded off the pavement and clattered to a halt. All across the plaza, the scream of warping metal faded away. The necron guns were silent.

"All hope is lost," pressed the Angel's voice. "Come out or-"

Gigaron's shelter exploded and collapsed, but he was already airborne, shooting out over the fallen tower and into the streets. Hopefully he could buy some time to recharge. He didn't want to weather another barrage like that in his current state.

Under an overpass. Down an alley. Through a tunnel, behind an apartment block, down a boulevard choked with inactive trucks.

Blackness ahead.

"You commit a most blasphemous irony if you seek to lose me," said the Angel, and raised one invisible hand.

Gigaron spun in midair and fired Rage Heart into the Angel's centre of mass.

Psyker power warred between them, then exploded in a shower of invisible lances. The boulevard was cut in half. A line of explosions marched up the façades of buildings on either side. Vehicles somersaulted out of the blast zone. Gigaron curved under a falling thirty-tonne hauler moments before it punched through the tarmac up to its windscreen. He shot past the Angel even as it was turning, pumping a series of blasts across his torso without looking.

Then he was away again, the wind howling away any cry of fury from behind.

There. He shot into the blackness, curved over the city and whistled across a rectangle of dust – perhaps a long-dead park – toward a magnificent high-rise decorated in rank upon rank of statues. Probably a monument to the founders of House Grelm.

He saw it coming and spread his hands just in time. One caught the Angel's energy blast in a circle of runes. The other cushioned his suddenly uncontrolled flight into the high-rise.

Through the window in a halo of pulverised glass. Desks and chairs exploded in a shower of wood and plastic. Doors splintered. He went through a wall, lost his grip on the protocol, and took the next wall on his shields. That was uncomfortable; beneath its decoration, the wall was titanium steel, part of the load-bearing core of the high-rise. Then he was tumbling, shattering through another office's desks in a maelstrom of paper and sawdust. Skipped once, burst through another cubicle wall and came to a rest in a scattering of dancing glass.

He could see the empty park through a tunnel of seven shattered walls. Outside, the emptiness moved.

Perfect.

"Divine blaster."

The emptiness flickered contemptuously out of view.

"Release!"

Magenta fire burst forth. Not down the tunnel, he wasn't aiming at the Angel.

He scythed the beam through the building's central support column.

There was a tortured groan from overhead, and his view of the park was suddenly cut off by a curtain of dust as the ceiling caved in. Gigaron staggered to his feet and smashed open the door behind him. It was time to go.

The ceiling ripped upwards in front of him. The whole building was toppling into the park.

As he shot out of the cataclysm, he risked a look back. Pieces of the falling high-rise blew out in showers of glass and statuary, but the Angel hadn't anticipated this chaotic mass of failing architecture. Every hole it blew in the building was sealed by fresh debris. A wave of ashen dust washed out across the city.

Gigaron damped his power signature and dived for the streets again. It wouldn't stop the Angel, but it would buy him some time.

On foot now, he dashed through an empty parking garage. Displays and smart signs hung blank and empty overhead; the surface of the tarmac displayed nothing. All intelligence in the city was clearly dead, right down to the road surfaces.

Down a level, where the garage gave out on a covered highway. An emergency vehicle hovered idly on centuries-old engines near the entrance; a sign on its towering side read "Tunnel Blockage Clearance Tool". The clawed forks on its front were big enough to lift a main battle tank. Two storeys above the ground, Gigaron could see a pale skeleton slumped back against the window of its cockpit.

Pale like porcelain.

He got his hand up just in time. The kiloton vehicle smashed into his shield, driving him back into the tunnel wall. Concrete fractured like spiderwebs before he could get his feet into place.

Then he pushed back.

The machine whined, its engine pods throbbing with heat. This was crazy. He couldn't hold out against such a behemoth for long.

"Rage Heart," he grunted. Rubble fell like rain around him. "Lethal mode."

"Yes, sir," said the Intelligence.

He kicked back, bracing against his own power for a moment. He needed enough room to aim the battle staff. The vehicle howled, smoke pouring from its pods.

The battle staff came down.

The vehicle split in half.

Gigaron braced himself as the two halves ripped past, smashed into the wall, and ground to a halt, sagging together above him. Molten metal dripped and oozed orange-red on every side. Rivulets of oil and electric sparks cascaded from severed conduits, ruptured machinery bulging like a disembowelled monster.

He squeezed his way down the cleft machine and back onto the street before the heat did too much damage to his remaining shields. The parking garage had partially collapsed down the line of his cutting beam, and parts of it were on fire.

Breathing heavily, he prepared to set out once more. That fight had cost him-

The ceiling ripped away.

Ahouul's Angel hovered above, blank and unknowable. Invisible hands grasped at the air with talons of night. Somehow he knew it was staring at him.

"The harder you run," it whispered, "the closer you come to me."

"Good," said Gigaron, and collapsed his flight protocol into Rage Heart. The blast wasn't quite on par with a divine blaster, but it caught the Angel by surprise. It rocketed back into an overpass, rebounded onto the road below, punched through into the tunnel, and tumbled to a halt amidst a scattering of ground vehicles.

When it sat up, he could see an angry line of substance across its upper chest, still spitting magenta sparks.

"My patience," it spat dully, "is growing hard to find."

Suddenly it was moving. Gigaron barely had time to snap a shot into its absence before it was upon him. An empty hand cracked against Rage Heart, batting the staff aside. Something flared between them. The Strike Magus went loose, preparing to be hurled backwards.

His shield shattered under the blast.

He staggered forward a step.

The Angel caught him by the face. The world went blank. He felt his body pitch and swing and then a tremendous force reverberated through his robe. Another sledgehammer blow, and he was flying through the air, eyesight free again, just in time to crash into the side of the cloven emergency vehicle. It jerked and crumpled at his impact.

"Surrender now," it hissed. "I have lost whatever magnanimity remained."

Gigaron heaved for breath. Shields were down. He'd stripped his flight spell for firepower. While his jacket and robe could shrug off mundane tank rounds with their enhanced weave, that suddenly seemed precious little protection.

"Funny," he gasped. "I was about to say the same thing. Will you come quietly?"

The Angel stared into him for a moment.

The first blow caught him in the chest. Energy reverberated back and forth through the protective jacket. Emergency fields sucked inertia from his neck and limbs to dampen whiplash. He felt the foot-thick shell of the vehicle split open around him; machinery and structural beams warped and ruptured and sprayed out around his passage.

The second blow smashed him upward through the vehicle, tumbling down its other side. Shards of machinery showered across the street. He felt his jacket scream, spasm, and then explode. Its reality field has absorbed too much damage.

Rage Heart wobbled in his grasp. The Angel paused atop the shattered vehicle, now little more than a heap of shattered metal, its umbra slashing at the surrounding air.

"I'm serious," he said. "Give up or you might get hurt."

The Angel laughed its soft sobbing laugh. "I will enjoy peeling-"

The warhammer hit it in the temple.

It bounced off the tunnel wall and almost lost its footing; turned in shock and rage to confront the unimagined interruption.

"Ho, Brother Gigaron!" roared the newcomer.

Gigaron grinned.

"Ho, Brother Vitus!"


	7. Warhammer

_Disclaimer: All Warhammer 40,000 concepts are property of Games Workshop. No challenge is intended._

* * *

><p><strong>7: Warhammer<strong>

* * *

><p>Seven feet of red battle robes. A braided beard like fire. A beret marked with a silver skull.<p>

A warhammer with a head the size of Gigaron's torso.

"Looks like you've got everything under control," boomed the astartes. "Rude of me to butt in, but you know how the Count gets when we're not smashing things!"

"Thank you, old friend." The grin stayed on his face. "We can do with some help on this one."

"Fools," said the Angel, and aimed a backhand at the astartes. He shot backward into the air, bringing the Iron Count into striking position. The warhammer's pointed head gleamed eagerly in the darkness; its thrust ports glowed hot. "Challenge an Angel of Chaos? Do you have any idea how much you stand to lose from this sin?"

"Ha." Vitus' brow furrowed. "You have no idea how much I've already lost to Chaos, imbecile. I was regretting my choices before the Emperors lost Cadia. Maybe if I beat you hard enough, you'll have one tenth my desire to _just make it stop_."

The Angel floated backwards through the rift in the tunnel's roof. "Impossible," it breathed. "Only the loyalist astartes ever lived so long, the holy legions of the Chaos Imperium! You... you run with the commoners. Traitor! What compels you to such corruption?"

"Nothing compels me but my own heart," said Vitus evenly. "Not any more. This little human beside me has a way of cutting to the truth of things."

"It's an Angel of Loss," said Gigaron, quietly compiling a new flight protocol. "It was present at the birth rites of something it called Ahouul. I don't think even it knows whether they succeeded, but best be careful – it's got daemons all through this city. And it's powerful."

"We noticed," said Vitus. "Brother, your shields are shattered. I'll cover you while you recharge."

"Too late," said the Angel, and levelled its hands down at the tunnel.

"Unknown war!"

Shockwaves of compressed air ripped down the tunnel. The parking building bucked upward and settled downward. Vehicles shrieked and skidded shedding sparks, scattered like playing cards.

Moments later, two plumes blasted out of the dust cloud, shrieking in towards the Angel from either side.

"No mercy for traitors or the corrupt," said the Angel. It raised its arms and unleashed a barrage of air-twisting bolts in both directions. Fire spilled into the sky; sparks danced across the shattered highway below.

The homing shots took it from the right, knocking it sideways in the air. Emptiness flared and spat.

"How -"

On the left, the smoke billowed away. Gigaron and Vitus stood on the air, each with a palm out. Runes danced and intersected. The combined shield held firm.

"Now," said Vitus. Gigaron span behind him and activated his transformation. Clasps disengaged, hovered, reversed; energy flowed in streamers, rebuilding his shields. The Angel howled and hammered another blow at the Strike Magus, but the astartes batted it aside with his hammer.

"Ready," said Gigaron. His jacket would take time to rebuild, but nothing could be done about that. A full shield was as good as it got. "Follow my lead."

Bolts hammered into the Angel from both sides. The duo spiralled away down the highway.

"I hate to tell you this, but it's not slowing down," said Vitus. He gripped his hammer. "The Count's still ringing from that last strike."

"That's an Angel-class psyker. I had to use high-end attack protocols to even scratch it, and I'm not sure I've even cracked its outer protection."

"So we need to use our heads for a while."

"Just stay alive. Everything has a limit."

Vitus frowned. "So do you, little human. Be careful."

"The same goes for you, Brother. Be aware of daemonhosts and necron sentries. Rage Heart, any progress on hacking their network?"

"No success in penetrating inner command codes," said the Intelligence.

"Copy your network taps to the Count. We'll need all the coordination we can get if we want to neutralise that Angel."

The buildings to their left exploded into the street. The Commonwealth magi shot into evasive manoeuvres, spiralling through the clouds of dust and glass and spinning girders. An unending shower of packing containers tumbled around them like knucklebones the size of houses. Every corner struck bright flames from the tarmac.

Gigaron sent a barrage of bolts back into the collapsing buildings. The Angel was using his own tricks against him, but they didn't have to make it easy.

Vitus swooped into the line of fire, already spinning the Iron Count. As he burst through the debris shower onto the parallel highway, the Intelligence ignited its thrusters. The warhammer described a crazed pinwheel and struck the Angel on its outstretched elbow.

The astartes recoiled in a shower of incandescent sparks. Something on the Angel's arm shattered and its aim swept wildly sideways, marching a line of detonations up the buildings and across the highway behind it. Before it could recover, Vitus spun the Count backwards and rammed its blunt end into the empty face.

He fired the thrusters again.

Spitting fire, the Angel clawed about it, but the magi had already retreated into the expanding cloud of debris. A dozen buildings slowly completed their descent into ruin; shattered windows gaped in their hundreds.

"Think I hurt it," panted Vitus. "Hit it hard enough to make my ears pop."

"It's not stupid. That won't work again."

"Still felt satisfying."

"We're nearly there. Be on your guard." He gestured at the plaza ahead, now the centre of a haze of half-settled dust that spread across the urban pile.

Screaming emptiness punched past Gigaron, sent Vitus down through the roof of a warehouse. Horizontal momentum sent him out one wall, into another building, bursting out onto the plaza in a shower of bricks. The Angel followed before the Strike Magus could retaliate, claws outstretched.

"Get back!" Gigaron unleashed a blast from above, punching into the battleground just in front of the astartes. The Angel drew up short. Maybe they had hurt it after all.

Or maybe it was just looking at him.

With a roar, the whole warehouse kicked into the air, describing a disintegrating arc towards Gigaron. He was suddenly busy deflecting cinderblocks.

Below, Vitus had retreated to the middle of the plaza, near a half-collapsed shelter made from slabs of pavement. The Angel stalked forward, spread its hands. Its umbra lashed at the sky behind it.

"Unknown war!"

Lances of invisible force fanned out. Tunnels of compressed pavement lifted as they punched into the ruined plaza. Vitus staggered back under blow after blow.

Sudden green fire concentrated on the Angel.

It shrieked in anger, and a shockwave of dust and masonry kicked up across the plaza. "How? I mangled every soulless one beyond repair! What does it take to make you fools stay down?"

"You missed one," said Gigaron, stepping out of the ruined warehouse. "I buried it in my shelter while you were distracted. Gift Soldiers just need an intact necrodermis template to regenerate. I thought that might be useful at some point. And one more thing.

"Release."

The Angel kicked back, rocking under the pressure of the blast, green flayer fire lashing at its flanks.

Vitus came down from above, hammer thrusters spitting fire.

The Angel's umbra clawed at the pavement, distributing the force of the blow. A knee-deep compression crater ten meters across blossomed around it. Wedges of splintered ceramic trembled like knives along its rim.

Gigaron slumped to one knee.

"At last," hissed the Angel. The Iron Count grated and spat sparks as it ground down its back. The Chaos psyker didn't seem to notice. "You weaken. Despair, human, and come to the god of the lost!"

"Not while I'm here," said Vitus, and brought the hammer in for another blow.

The Angel caught it in one hand.

"Ah, traitor astartes. Such a long life you have led. So eager to lose it."

"That which was lost... can be found once more."

Across the plaza, Gigaron pulled himself to his feet. With an effort, he brought his battle staff level with the Angel.

"Rage Heart. Stun mode."

The Angel made an incredulous noise. Green fire raked ineffectively at the air about its featureless face. "You still persist. It will disappoint you to learn that I no longer regret this. You, however, may wish to ponder what could have been in the brief time left you."

"Eyes up front," said Vitus, and dropped a pair of mini-missiles from his off hand. The blast knocked him and the Iron Count back a half dozen paces. His boots ground to a halt in a spray of gravel; the plaza could barely be recognised as an artificial construct any more beneath the dust and scattered fragments of masonry.

The Angel flowed out of the smoke cloud like a shadow.

Vitus grinned and raised his warhammer.

Above the Angel, something moved in the sky.

Hammer clashed against shadow. Sparks spattered across the wreckage. Vitus went tumbling, lodged up against a piece of barricade, rocketed back against the empty psyker.

"You cannot prevail!" it whispered. "Your kind failed in the defence of the Eye, swept away by the commoner magi. I combine the ancient sorceries with all the science of the Commonwealth. I am the favoured of Chaos! You shall kneel to your true masters once more!"

"Never!" roared the astartes, smashing aside the grasping talons with swing after swing of his weapon. "Chaos is decrepit, a relic of a bygone age! While you've been gazing at your navel in the dark, others have been pushing back ignorance. Your science is -"

A backhand punched through his shields, caught him on the chin. He flipped backwards in a flurry of robes.

As his eyes swept across the dark sky, he was grinning.

"Insouciant betrayer," hissed the Angel. "Even now, you – wait – what-"

Gigaron brought his foot down on the plaza's edge.

"All this fighting has released so much energy," he growled. "The Warp reverberates around us. Winds of magic, return! All the violence, focus and redouble!"

Rage Heart shone with a light that seared the ground before him.

"Starlight!"

The Angel saw Vitus scrambling away as though in slow motion. The light washed out across the plaza. Distant towers lit up in reflected brilliance.

"Breaker!"


	8. Loss

_Disclaimer: All Warhammer 40,000 concepts are property of Games Workshop. No challenge is intended._

* * *

><p><strong>8: Loss<strong>

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><p>The energy beam engulfed the Angel completely.<p>

Wave after wave of magenta flame roared out of Rage Heart into the plaza. Impact dust caught fire and showered across surrounding buildings in threads of magma. Gouts of fire erupted from the impact zone, splashing soot and magma many paces across the wreckage. Pieces of gravel skipped away from the blasts, tossed on baking winds.

Ribbons of energy poured into Gigaron's staff. Vents on the weapon howled and spat coolant.

The last wave of flame lashed out, but the fury of the impact seemed to simply grow for long moments before finally collapsing.

A final blinding conflagration ripped out from the fireball. The ground shook. Every window in line of sight blew out, cascading across ceilings before the pressure from the ground could subside.

Smouldering wreckage pattered down across the city.

The Gift Soldiers stood silently, weapons trained on the pillar of flame and smoke that now consumed the heart of the plaza.

Vitus limped toward Gigaron. "Remind me why I never want to battle you again. Gods, but you frighten me sometimes."

The Strike Magus frowned. "Rage Heart, are you alright?"

"Primary capacitors overheated. Coolant systems depleted. I am sorry, I will require maintenance before I can guarantee function."

"It's all right, you did your best. We'll get the technicians on the Flame to look you over when we get out of here. Rest a while."

"But... you are lost... like me."

Gigaron's skin crawled. No. Not after all that.

A shadow stepped out of the flames.

Its umbral cloak was gone. A featureless human silhouette stood listing against the light. Patches of its unseen surface writhed with flames, spat brilliant sparks of energy.

"A most... clever attack protocol. Gather all the energy wasted in battle... and refine it into one final blow. Evidently the commoners have been busy since I was trapped here."

It took another step forward. Somewhere, a necron weapon barked, but the empty psyker didn't even flinch.

"But you are too weak to use it properly. Relying on devices and machines to bolster your own spirit."

It raised its hands.

Gigaron gasped. "Stop! Don't do it!"

"Begging will not save you, not now. Let me show you what a truly powerful mind can wreak!"

Once again, the sky swirled. Energy sparkled and spiralled inward.

"No, you fool! You can't control the energy!"

The Angel lifted off the ground, energy glowing brighter around it. It looked uncertain for a moment.

Gigaron took a step forward. "The starlight breaker ends battles by disrupting the Warp flows themselves! Don't you understand? I stopped before the flows grew uncontrollable – and they haven't calmed! You'll destroy yourself!"

"Better to die pure than to lose to an infidel," whispered the Angel, almost to itself. Power crackled around it like an electric halo. Bolts of lightning barked into the gravel below.

"Release it now! We can help you!"

"Too late," said the Angel.

And exploded.

Torn rags of its being hurtled in all directions, falling to dust and smoke as they went. In a split second, the last Angel of Ahouul was gone.

But at the Angel's heart, something hung spitting in mid-air.

"No," said Gigaron. Then, "No!"

The spitting object was growing smaller, but brighter.

"What is that?" Vitus readied the Count again. "It's not some new daemon, is it? I feel no intellect, no passion."

"The Angel's heart must have imploded under all that power," said Gigaron. "Shield it, quickly! It's being consumed by a singularity!"

"What, like a black hole?"

"Exactly like a black hole! That energy is going to collapse into an event horizon in seconds!"

The astartes leveled the Iron Count. "Say no more. Getting sucked into a black hole would be a terrible end to my glorious legend!"

Gigaron pushed himself to his feet. Runes swam around his hands. "No, old friend. It's far too small to have a gravity well. But such a tiny black hole – quantum fluctuations will bleed off its entire mass as energy very quickly. It could take mere nanoseconds after the event horizon forms."

Vitus blinked. The Count wavered in his grasp. "But that singularity has to mass in the kilograms! That's dozens of times the size of the entire positron arsenal on a cruise titan! A blast that size..."

"Could depopulate a small continent."

"Gods!"

"We'll never contain it ourselves. If we pulse our shields at the right moment, however, we can induce it to discharge in one direction. Help me lens the event horizon straight upwards – we're in an artificial spacetime and I don't know if there's any safe direction..."

"But blasting the roof should do the least harm. Very well. It's been an honour serving with you, Brother."

Gigaron smiled. "Likewise, Brother. Rage Heart, can you synchronise with the Count to tune the event horizon?"

"I will try my best."

"All I can ask. Thank you." He levelled the weapon at the singularity. "Ready?"

"Ready."

Runes and focal lenses sprang into being around the Intelligences. Numbers danced, energy built. The devices were battered, metal scorched, gems cracked. But they didn't fail.

The shields sprang up cupped around the singularity and squeezed.

Within the cup, the sparkling object shrank faster and faster. Without warning, it vanished. Gigaron half expected to see a ripple of distorted light, but of course the mass was too small to show a gravity ring effect.

Instead, kilogrammes of mass squeezed into a single point, pushed space-time past its limits, and spilled out again as high energy photons.

The world went white.

There was a noise. It was probably his own scream, because eventually it stopped.

He couldn't hear anything.

He blinked. The plaza was still there, but it was so brilliant it hurt his eyes.

_Brother Vitus? I think it worked._

Vitus, also shielding his eyes, mouthed something in response. Gigaron let it go. Where was that light coming from?

Above.

His eyes were adjusting. He could see shapes moving in the sky. Birds? No, pieces of debris. The scale was deceiving. Some of those chunks were bigger than the plaza, but the corridor was so vast they were taking long seconds to reach the now-illuminated city in plumes of no-longer unimaginable destruction.

Higher. They had succeeded in focusing the blast. It had carved a hole through the city's ceiling, punching through into another chamber. The light was coming from there.

Gigaron hoped they hadn't crippled the Astronomican.

He gestured to Vitus. A nod. Silently they rose into the sky. There was a ringing in his ears now. Maybe his hearing would return before he really needed it.

The city spread out below them, washed in light from above. The dust and wreckage cut a massive looping scar across its rolling structure. Still, most of it was still intact.

The ceiling had not been so lucky. It was still calving rubble, megatonne chunks peeling free of the warped remnants of girders broader than highways. Another layer of metal had buckled upwards in a ruinous blossom the size of a suburb.

But the explosive force had travelled no further. The next chamber above was smaller, like a bell five kilometers across. It was the source of the light; the walls themselves glowed.

"Source of space-time interference detected," said Rage Heart. His hearing was recovering quickly now.

"It's an organ of the Astronomican itself," said Vitus.

"Of course," said Gigaron. "The beacon is a psi-amp, but it was built to stabilise the Warp. When the SAC tried to spawn a new Chaos God, it triggered safety protocols and sealed off the whole complex. That's why the poor Angel was trapped in here."

"It wouldn't want your pity," noted Vitus.

"I don't care," said Gigaron. "Astronomican of Realm Glorious! I am Strike Magus Gigaron of the Commonwealth! Acknowledge my presence! We have changes to discuss!"

His voice echoed away into the vast chamber.


	9. Sunset

_Disclaimer: All Warhammer 40,000 concepts are property of Games Workshop. No challenge is intended._

* * *

><p><strong>9: Sunset<strong>

* * *

><p>Colonel Narvariel was on the front lines when the first figures trudged out of the corridor. The Strike Magus and a hulking red astartes clutching a battered warhammer.<p>

A few steps behind them came a pair of necrons carrying a stretcher, on which was bound a pale figure in House Grelm robes. More necrons filed out onto the road, carrying more survivors.

High above, the sides of the Astronomican rumbled and slid apart for the first time in centuries.

Slowly, carefully, the beacon opened like a flower.

* * *

><p><strong>Afterword<strong>

_Thanks to Brett Tamahori, without whose sage consultation the future history would be immeasurably poorer._

Obviously this story is not the normal 40K story. That's entirely the point. The more you know about 40K, the stranger this story should seem.

I call this version of the setting '60K'. (Incidentally I had to start calling the whole setting the K-verse to distinguish the two versions.) It may not be exactly the 601st century, as the exact count is only of interest to certain arcane historians, but it's close.

In 60K the 40K attitude of intolerance and ruthless factionalism has been replaced by one of inclusiveness and tolerance. Nobody knows when this began or who introduced the concept; some ancient civilizations from the dark age before the Commonwealth call it 'Saint Tau's Blessing' but nobody knows who Tau was.

As a result of open societies and actual galactic trade, technology has marched ahead. So has human evolution. Standard equipment in 60K would be impossible even in the Dark Age of Technology before the mythic First Imperium. It is based on psi-amp technology, refining and focusing the user's mental energies through strict protocols. Psi-amp technology is lightweight and adaptable; heavy armour has been outdated by complex field arrays and flexible robe armour built from smart nanomaterials.

I've tried to bring more science fiction to the space fantasy of the K-verse, and as a result the finale turned out to be a fight against a black hole. Aside from the fact that it's created by psychic pressure from the Immaterium and hangs in the middle of the air, the black hole is as scientifically accurate as possible. Black holes do not magically increase gravity, despite what Vitus thinks. They do, theoretically, evaporate through a process called Hawking radiation, and the smaller they are, the faster this occurs. Mass-energy conversion really is astonishingly energetic. This is probably the most realistic scene in the whole story. I carefully distributed the supporting science through the narrative so the action didn't come screaming to a halt while I gave a lecture on quantum thermodynamics and Einstein's famous equation.

It would be rank dishonesty to claim that 60K and this story took no influence from elsewhere. The primary inspiration is, of course, Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha and sequels. I realised this had to be the case when I saw the first episode of Nanoha A's in which brutal warhammer combat takes the stage. "How can Warhammer top this?" I asked myself. And in truth it couldn't. This seemed like a shame, so when I took on the task of advancing the K-verse timeline Nanoha influenced a lot of the implementations of new technology.

And then I had to put the cast of Nanoha into the K-verse.

In this story I have changed names, genders, and physical descriptions while attempting to keep both the K-verse and Nanoha in mind. However, this is not a crossover project so 40K always took precedent. For example, some readers may be disappointed that Vitus is not a tiny girl with a large hammer. The best way to echo the character's backstory themes was to make her into a former Chaos Marine, so she had to become an astartes and by extension male. I do not imagine the character is otherwise much different.

And, of course, I believe that the K-verse should be full of burly men shouting, "Ho, brother," which explains why everybody else got 63ed as well.

I renamed a number of Nanoha things to better fit the K-verse. For example, "Divine Buster" became "Divine Blaster: Release", because what's a buster, and why are we shouting out attack names anyway? (Hopefully the story makes it clear that they're safety mechanisms required for tactical weaponry.) "Starlight Breaker" retains its title and most of its tactical properties as a finisher.

Both "Divine" and "Starlight" are perfect epithets for the psyker techniques in question. The Commonwealth is protected by the divine Starchild who labours on the holy world of Mars, perpetually consumed in the task of holding the Necron collective inert. (This was the eventual source of the Gift Soldiers, and the end of the long and terrible Dark Age that began after the fall of the First Imperium. 50K was not a pleasant time to be a human.) The Starchild taught the Commonwealth how to create new gods to stand in his place; the twenty-one current Star Gods are part of that program. The Star Gods aid the Commonwealth with their psyker schools, assisting in the evolution of human genetics and culture. As a Commonwealth Magus, Gigaron has trained in one such school and now helps spread the wisdom of the Star Gods. "Starlight Breaker" is not just a fancy name, but an invocation of the wrath of real and active divinities.

Although it's not hugely apparent, there is also some influence from Neon Genesis Evangelion in the design of the cruise titan vessels. These are not the lumbering terrestrial hulks of 40K, but sleek, athletic star vessels crammed full of psi-amp technology and very definitely self-aware. Cruise titans are the absolute upper limit; most titans are smaller, short-ranged ships that can use their limbs for rapid aim and manoeuvre in freefall. Larger warships take a more traditional shape, although they too will be self-aware. The Eldar Navigator Houses do not field cruise titans of their own, believing them to be a tactically flawed design, so Captain Khron may be indulging a personal penchant by volunteering to captain one for the Commonwealth.

Fortunately, there is no cause for the apocalyptic angst that normally accompanies an Eva.

In general, I've assumed that the rules of the K-verse are still in effect, but that says nothing about the style or attitudes of cultures within that setting. This is deliberately missing the point, of course. 60K is a deliberate antithesis to the grim darkness of 40K. Hopefully it grants you a new perspective on the original.

60K is sleek, futuristic, vast, and optimistic. However, it is still a galaxy of brutal warfare, and the future is not as bright as it may seem. The canny reader will pick up on several very foolish and idealistic attitudes that could easily bring grief to both the Commonwealth and the Chaos Imperium. And this story was deliberately limited in scope, focusing mainly on the Commonwealth, Chaos and the major species of galactic culture. You didn't need to know about the Voice of War, and nobody yet knows of the star-devouring shadow approaching the Milky Way...


End file.
